‘Us’ and ‘Them’: The role
of religion in mediating and
challenging the ‘model minority’
and other civic boundaries
Elaine Howard Ecklund
Version of record first published: 18 Aug 2006.

To cite this article: Elaine Howard Ecklund (2005): ‘Us’ and ‘Them’: The role of religion
in mediating and challenging the ‘model minority’ and other civic boundaries, Ethnic
and Racial Studies, 28:1, 132-150
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0141987042000280049

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Ethnic and Racial Studies Vol. 28 No. 1 January 2005 pp. 132 150
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‘Us’ and ‘Them’: The role of religion in
mediating and challenging the ‘model
minority’ and other civic boundaries
Elaine Howard Ecklund

Abstract
This article examines how Korean Americans use the cultural resources
of religious communities to mediate race, ethnic, and socio-economic
boundaries that have consequences for civic life. Specifically, I compare
involvement of Korean Americans in second-generation Korean congregations to those in multiethnic churches. I find Korean Americans who
participate in second-generation Korean churches use religion to largely
reproduce images of Korean Americans as model minorities, and
implicitly distance themselves from those whom they perceive as less
financially successful. In contrast, Korean Americans in multiethnic
congregations use religion to emphasize the commonality Korean
Americans have with other minorities. By using a cultural framework
that allows for the agency of individuals in identity and group boundary
construction, this work more generally shows the potential for new
Americans to use the cultural resources of local organizations to change
existing ethnic and racial boundaries in the United States.

Constructing the ‘model minority’ and other group boundaries
Media, government, and schools portray Asian Americans as the
‘model minority’, contending that ethnic cultural traits predispose
them to be financially and educationally successful (Osajima 1988;
Okihiro 1994). These images foster boundaries between Asian Americans and other non-white Americans (Abelman and Lie 1995). The
work of Won Moo Hurh and Kwang Chung Kim (1989), and Ronald
Takaki (2000) challenges the societal and institutional production of
such stereotypes. Their research examines the socio-economic diversity

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in the Asian American community and the differences in resources
with which Asian immigrants come to the United States (Hurh and
Kim 1989; Takaki 2000). Nazli Kibria (1997, 1998) and Paul Wong
and his co-authors (1998) show how Asian Americans use the model
minority stereotype and other societal boundaries in forming their
own identities.
Rarely, however, do researchers ask how Asian Americans use the
cultural resources of organizational memberships to respond to
societal boundaries and construct identities. For example, how do
different collectives of Asian Americans, even within the same
ethnicity, create diverse boundaries around race, ethnicity and class
and what consequences do such understandings have on their
participation in civil society?
This article examines one Asian American group: second-generation
Korean Americans.1 I compare Korean Americans who attend secondgeneration Korean churches to those who are part of multiethnic
churches, and ask to what extent Korean Americans in these different
contexts reproduce images of themselves as model minorities and
other group boundaries. I further ask what implications understandings of group boundaries, or who constitutes ‘us’ and ‘them,’ have on
civic life for second-generation Korean Americans. By ‘civic life’ I
mean both how individuals socially construct their responsibilities as
citizens and the extent to which they participate in voluntary and
political practices and associations. I focus on one particular aspect of
civil society: how Korean Americans in different ethnic religious
contexts view their responsibilities to help non-Koreans in social
service settings.
The moral content of civic boundaries
Central scholars of racial formation, such as Fredrik Barth (1969),
Michael Omi and Howard Winant (1994), have argued that new
Americans socially construct racial boundaries based on existing
categories in the United States. Over time the Irish became ‘white,’ for
example (Ignatiev 1995). Alejandro Portes (1996) and Mary Waters
(1999) contend post-1965 US immigrants often try to resist being
identified with those who American society perceives as lower-class
and instead pursue connection with Americans who are viewed as
financially successful.
However, researchers have underestimated the extent to which new
Americans might challenge existing racial, ethnic and class boundaries. An aspect of the ways in which individuals create group
boundaries is shaped by societal constructs of race, ethnicity and
class. Through using a cultural lens that allows for individual agency
(Bourdieu 1973; Giddens 1984; Swidler 1986) I also argue, however,

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Elaine Howard Ecklund

that individuals themselves shape aspects of their own identities (Nagel
1994; Cornell 1996). One way they do this is through drawing on the
ideological and other resources in their religious organizations, not
only to reproduce but to re-define boundaries and inter-ethnic group
life (Becker 1998; Emerson and Smith 2000).
The ways individuals create distance between themselves and others
have moral in addition to ethnic dimensions. Moral boundaries, as
Miche`le Lamont (1992) explains, help an individual to make a
distinction between oneself, the members of one’s group, and
individuals and groups that one perceives as ‘other’ (Lamont 1992;
Lamont and Molnar 2002). These boundaries often have elements of
‘right and wrong’ with civic consequences, and determine with whom
one joins in political and social life. Religious communities are a
central place where Americans develop rhetoric for moral discussion
and methods of classification for defining who is more or less ‘right or
holy’ (Bourdieu 1991; Wuthnow 1991). The spiritual interpretations of
race, ethnicity and class in a congregation influence identity development among individuals through attaching moral meaning to such
categories (Yancey 1998; Emerson and Smith 2000). These moral
meanings have civic dimensions, providing members with ways to
decide whom to help in both religious and non-religious settings.
Religion has an important place in motivating civic participation
among the general American population (Wilson and Janoski 1995;
Wuthnow 1995; Regnerus, Smith and Sikkink 1998), as well as, an
historic role in immigrant adaptation. Religion both breaks down
group boundaries, motivating individuals to help those outside their
religious and ethnic communities, and helps them to retain ethnic and
religious boundaries (Wuthnow 1995). Will Herberg (1955) writes in
his work, Protestant, Catholic, Jew that for European immigrants,
native religion was a reminder of home for the first generation. For the
second generation religious and ethnic life was full of complexities, as
they struggled with what it meant to adapt to a new environment. By
the third generation the ethnic group was American, and no longer
tied to their country of origin. Instead, national ethnic distinctions
were blurred and new Americans found self-location in the legitimate
American religions of Protestantism, Catholicism, and Judaism. Given
this context the study of how new second-generation immigrants use
religion to negotiate civic boundaries is particularly relevant.
Korean Americans
Korean Americans are a good population among whom to study how
religious communities mediate categories that influence civic life. They
form an older cohort than many other post-1965 second-generation
immigrants, meaning civic practices, such as community involvement

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and political participation, are more pertinent than they might be for
those who have not yet reached young adulthood.2 Further, some firstgeneration Koreans come to the United States with the forms of
capital necessary to succeed economically, meaning their children may
have the kinds of resources that often foster civic participation in the
wider American population (Verba, Schlozman and Brady 1995).3
Religion plays a central role in first- and second-generation Asian
American communities, and particularly among Korean Americans
(Kwon, Kim and Warner 2001; Min and Kim 2002). I study Korean
Americans in evangelical congregations because evangelicalism is
popular among Korean Americans and Americans more broadly
(Min 1992; Kwon, Kim and Warner 2001; Min and Kim 2002). By
evangelical I mean those who have a specific mission to tell others
about their faith with the hope of converting them to Christianity
(Smith et al. 1998).4
I discovered diversity in the ways in which Korean Americans
connected Christianity with race and class identities. Those who
participated in a second-generation congregation saw their own and
their parent’s generation as inherently more hard working than other
minority groups, reinforcing boundaries between themselves and other
non-white Americans. Such boundaries mean that they had difficulty
helping those they viewed as less hard working; often Korean
Americans put black Americans in this category, and in so doing
reified the model minority stereotype.5 Korean Americans in multiethnic churches, however, generally had a different kind of rhetoric for
boundary construction. The multiethnic churches I studied made
being an ethnically diverse organization central to their core mission of
‘sharing the gospel’, providing a legitimate religious narrative for
Korean Americans to emphasize their commonality with other
minorities and feel more equipped to help them in social service
settings.
Data collection
The data for this article were taken from a larger project that I
conducted from January 2002 through January 2003. During those
thirteen months, I did nine months of participant-observation in two
central congregations, Grace Church, a second-generation Korean
congregation and Manna Fellowship, a multiethnic church.6 Both
churches were located in the Northeast of the United States, near a
small urban area, which I called Old Town. I conducted a survey of the
ethnic composition of each church [N 225]. In addition, I did
national interviews with second-generation Korean Americans in four
multiethnic and three second-generation congregations in addition to
Grace and Manna, for a total of nine congregations. The findings of
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this study are based on participant-observation and eighty-eight indepth interviews, including interviews I conducted with Korean
Americans at Grace and Manna, the two central churches, as well as
those with Korean Americans outside the two churches.
The close proximity of Grace and Manna to Old Town made it
easier to observe their differences in relating to the community.
Twenty-four per cent of families with children under five in Old
Town lived in poverty, in comparison to 17 per cent of the US
population overall; in terms of racial composition, the area had a large
percentage of black Americans and Asian immigrants. Grace had
ninety members and Manna had 150 members. Both churches were
non-denominational and described themselves as evangelical. Each
conducted its services in English and shared a building with another
church. The class composition of Manna and Grace were also similar;
both churches largely comprised young professionals.
I selected Grace because it was a second-generation congregation
affiliated with a first-generation church. Yet, it also had an independent pastoral team; in these ways the church had a structure typical of
many second-generation Korean congregations in the United States
(Chai 2001; Kwon, Kim and Warner 2001). A survey I conducted
showed the church was nearly all second-generation Korean, with only
three members self-identifying as part of an Asian ethnic group other
than Korean. I selected Manna because it was a multiethnic
congregation and in close proximity to Grace. A church survey
showed 15 per cent of those at Manna identified as ‘White American;’
3 per cent as ‘African American;’ 73 per cent as ‘Asian American,’ one
per cent as ‘Hispanic American,’ and 8 per cent as ‘Other’. The Asian
American members of the congregation were from various Asian
ethnic groups, including Chinese, Cambodian, Asian Indian, Vietnamese and Filipino. The Asian Americans were nearly all secondgeneration immigrants and, of the Asian Americans, 22 per cent were
Korean. Using Michael Emerson and Karen Chai Kim’s (2003)
definition of a multiracial congregation, the church was demographically multiracial because less than 80 per cent of its membership was
any single racial group. The pastors and leadership of the congregation
called the church multiethnic, however, and that is how I will refer to it
throughout this article.
The interviews with Korean Americans in churches outside Grace
and Manna were done in order to locate the two churches in the midst
of other congregations of a similar type. I interviewed people in these
other places also to be sure that the patterns I found at Grace and
Manna were not unique to the region I studied and found they were
not regionally specific. These interviews were conducted either in
person or over the phone. I talked in person with Korean American
leaders and members of churches in New Jersey, New York and

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California. Additional interviews in Michigan, Illinois, California, and
New York were done over the phone. I located national respondents
through referrals from people at Grace and Manna or through my
national respondents’ previous participation in a college campus
evangelical ministry.
The interviews lasted between one and three hours and were semistructured. Of the eighty-eight interviews, forty-six were conducted
with those in the two central churches and forty-two with Korean
Americans in the other churches. Forty-eight per cent of my
respondents were men and 52 per cent were women. Besides their
choice of church, my respondents were similar in other ways. They
were all second-generation Korean Americans, young adults, between
twenty-one and forty years old and American citizens. In addition,
most were professionals in occupations such as teaching, medicine,
business, or in graduate school. All the Korean Americans I talked
with had or were pursuing a four-year college degree. Many spoke
some Korean, although very few were bilingual, and all were
completely fluent in English. Finally, my respondents had generally
been a part of their respective congregation for at least a year.
I drew portions of interview data analysed for this article from a
longer interview guide and transcribed and coded these sections for
themes related to the connection between church participation and
views of others, with particular attention to discussion of socioeconomic difference, race and ethnicity (Strauss and Corbin 1990). I
based analyses for this article primarily on the following questions:
How did you come to choose your current congregation?
If any, in what kinds of ways does your church influence the views
you have about your relationship to your community?
What people would you find easiest to help in a volunteer setting?
Who would you find it more difficult or distance yourself from
helping?
The purpose of this research is not to make a strict causal argument
between congregational participation and the views of individual
church members, controlling for other factors. To do so I would need
access to data, which followed transitions between churches and
allowed the study of correlation between congregational type and
attitudes towards ethnic and civic boundaries. Rather, I am more
concerned with how Korean Americans used the cultural resources of
their congregations to develop civic group boundaries once they were
already a part of their respective churches. I did, however, ask my
respondents why they chose their particular congregation. None of the
Korean Americans I talked with said they attended their church
because of its view of Korean American financial success or approach

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to civic life. They explained their choice of congregation largely in
religious terms. Those at Grace generally wanted to remain part of a
Korean church because they thought Korean congregations were more
oriented around central Christian teachings and/or more focused on
evangelism than non-Korean churches. Most Korean Americans at
Manna, who were equally evangelical in Christian orientation as those
at Grace, told me they chose the church because they disagreed with
the approach second-generation Korean congregations had to Christianity. Korean Americans in other second-generation Korean and
multiethnic churches gave similar responses.
Reproducing boundaries
According to Karen Chai (1998, 2001) and Kelly Chong (1998),
Korean American congregations and fellowship groups often reproduce intertwined images of prestige, cultural hierarchy, and Korean
Americans as model minorities. In one sense, Korean Americans at
Grace and other second-generation churches used religious discourse
to de-emphasize wealth accumulation. In another sense, however, both
explicitly and implicitly, Korean American leaders in these congregations affirmed cultural ideals that Korean Americans were predisposed
to financial achievement. During our interview, I asked Pastor Joseph,
the head pastor of Grace, what kind of needs were faced by people in
the congregation:
The second-generation Korean mentality is to need success. The first
generation immigrated and they worked so their kids could have a
better life. It is common to see the child drive a superior car to the
parents. There is the perceived need to make lots of money. But the
real need, I think, is to grow in the knowledge of the Bible.
Pastor Joseph wanted to be different from the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Korean mentality to
need successâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;. His congregation should focus on things he considered
most important to Christianity, such as commitment to understanding
the Bible. Behind his statement, however, was also the assumption that
Korean immigrant parents and their American-born children were
successful financially.
Conversations with other leaders and individual members confirmed a similar tension. Joshua, thirty-one, worked as a businessman
and was actively involved as a church leader at Grace. He told me a big
concern for second-generation Koreans in his church was the struggle
against making financial attainment the ultimate marker of meaning:
Because of our ethnic identity and our culture (emphasis added) we
are very ambitious as a people. Korean Americans are very ambitious

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(emphasis added). Our parents tell us that we have to go to school
and we have to get an ‘‘A’’ and we have to become lawyers and
doctors. And if we don’t achieve some sort of social status, then we
feel kind of belittled and inferior. If you look at our church . . .
maybe only one or two people are not in graduate school, or are not
doctors or lawyers. So we are very ambitious.
Christian rhetoric provided Joshua with multiple ways (or as Ann
Swidler (1986) writes, ‘cultural tools’) to interpret wealth. For
example, he could have viewed the resources of congregation members
as ‘undeserved blessing’ from God. Yet, for Joshua, attending a
congregation with other Korean American young professionals further
confirmed an aspect of the model minority image; achievement was
something ‘inherent’ and part of Korean American ethnic culture.
Pastors and leaders also used Christian rhetoric in ways that
implicitly reinforced boundaries between other ethnic groups. In at
least three different sermons during the time I was part of Grace, the
pastor told members that to acknowledge discrimination or poverty
was to ‘act like a victim’ and remove one’s focus from God. For
example, one Sunday Pastor Joseph cautioned the church against
devoting too much attention to their problems, poverty, or discrimination:
Grace needs to get their eyes off themselves and their own problems.
We can not have that mentality and be a blessing . . . We need to
focus on the needs of other people . . . How many people in this
church see themselves as a victim? Jesus did not come so you would
be a victim, but that you would overcome.
‘Getting one’s eyes off oneself’ or ‘not acting like a victim’ directed
congregation members towards involvement in community social
services. However, the approach Grace had to spirituality also had
the unintended consequence of creating distance between Korean
Americans and those they perceived as members of a class or ethnic
group that talked about being ‘victimized.’
The media has often reported on the inter-racial conflict between
first-generation Korean store owners and black American customers
in urban areas (Abelman and Lie 1995). None of those I talked with at
Grace or other second-generation Korean congregations overtly told
me they experienced conflict with black Americans. Seventy-one per
cent of Korean Americans at Grace, however, specifically said Korean
Americans were ‘model minorities’, or mentioned they were inherently
wealthy or predisposed to success. Many also mentioned their distance
from other ethnic minority groups based on these attributes. Bill,
twenty-six, worked as a computer engineer and attended Grace. The

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way Bill talked about his relationship to black Americans reflected the
rhetoric of the church sermons at Grace. As Bill put it, his parents
succeeded ‘against the odds’ and were worthy of help. In contrast, Bill
saw black Americans as a group he would find it challenging to help in
a social service setting:
Maybe because of slavery, they always seem like they have a chip on
their shoulder. Some are very proud and they don’t want help. They
can do it on their own. I find that group tougher than others. Not all
of them, but they always seem to have a chip on their shoulder
because of racism. I feel bad because I don’t think that’s the case
anymore.
Bill mentioned positive friendships with black American co-workers.
Yet, neither his friendship with black Americans at work, nor his
motivation as a Christian to help those who had less, was able to
overcome his opinion that many black Americans had ‘a chip on their
shoulder,’ and often ‘acted like victims’. In his mind, these factors
made it difficult for Bill to help black Americans in a social service
setting.
Sixty-nine per cent of Korean Americans in other second-generation
congregations had a similar approach as Grace to the connection
between Christianity and the creation of ethnic boundaries. In
particular, I noticed these views when we were talking about black
Americans. Daniel, twenty-eight, worked as a pharmacist and
attended a second-generation Korean church located in New Jersey.
Daniel told me that he thought ‘African Americans were often jealous’
of Korean American prosperity. When I asked Daniel why, in his
opinion, black Americans ‘didn’t get ahead’ he explained:
They need to go to school and to work hard and not complain and
spend so much time rioting like the Malcolm X people. Martin
Luther King I respect immensely, but not Malcolm X . . . African
Americans don’t want to get ahead, it seems, and just don’t work.
Daniel tried to make it very clear during our discussion that he did not
discriminate against black Americans. This quote is most salient
because of what it said about the way Daniel created group
boundaries. He thought of himself as a typical Korean American: a
Christian, hard-working, young professional. Daniel also told me the
best American citizens were those who were Christians and worked
diligently in their chosen profession. Those who he perceived as
‘working hard’ were more worthy and deserving of help.
Grace sponsored several social services to the surrounding community. Yet, identities as ‘middle-class professionals’ made it difficult to

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relate to those in the community to whom they were providing social
services. According to Simeon, twenty-five and a seminary student,
when Korean Americans at Grace did an outreach to a local youth
shelter for at-risk teenagers, Simeon wondered,
how the kids look at us when we come, because we are, you know,
suburban Korean Americans. We received the best education. Like
(Korean American) high school kids, they already have cars and we
don’t really worry about finances and generally we come from pretty
good famil(ies). And for us to come and really help them out, I feel
that the kids might not buy it.
Simeon communicated a genuine desire to provide social services for
the ‘at-risk’ youth in Old Town. Yet, he also had a set of implicit
categories that made the teenagers they were reaching out to seem
‘other’. The adolescents came from ‘urban’ areas, ‘bad’ families, or
were more generally from ‘a different place’. Later in our discussion,
when I asked Simeon whom he might find easiest to help in a social
service setting, he told me he would be most likely to help those who
were like him, ‘other young adult Korean Americans’. Based on my
observations and informal discussions with the leaders of the youth
shelter where Grace volunteered, most of the teens there were racial
and ethnic minorities; the shelter housed mainly black American and
Latino/a youth, who did not have educational or economic resources.
Simeon’s choice to stress an identity as a middle-class suburban
American, however, rather than an identity as an ethnic minority, was
very much a social decision and differed from identity construction
among many of the Korean Americans who attended multiethnic
congregations
Re-negotiating model minority boundaries
Rudy Busto (1996), in his study of Asian American evangelical college
fellowships, argues that evangelicalism often reinforces images of
Asian Americans as model minorities. I found, however, that under
certain conditions Korean American young professionals used evangelical Christianity to challenge stereotypes of Korean Americans as
model minorities and stress their commonality with other Americans,
acts that have the potential to re-shape the content of racial and ethnic
boundaries.
Korean Americans who attended Manna were just as educated and
as financially successful as were people at Grace. Attending a diverse
church facilitated intimate relationships with those of other ethnic
backgrounds. More than social interactions, however, Manna also
provided sermons and public teachings to interpret inter-ethnic

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relationships. My discussions with Korean Americans at Manna and
those in other multiethnic churches reflected the emphasis their
congregations placed on solidarity and commonality with other ethnic
minorities. In particular, sermons and public teachings at Manna
stressed that accumulated wealth resulted largely from God’s blessings
rather than the hard work of individuals. This focus gave Korean
Americans religious language to talk about what they had in common
with other ethnic minorities, a perspective that facilitated civic
relationships, particularly those with black Americans.
According to the congregational brochure, one of Manna’s core
values was to ‘see the church as a group of people with different
cultures’. In the church brochure, Manna justified this ‘multiethnic
vision’ by supporting passages from the Bible that talked about
‘developing a church without walls in the area of cultures and
backgrounds’. During teachings and sermons the leaders also stressed
the importance of developing a multiethnic congregation. In one
sermon, Pastor Phil, a Chinese immigrant American and one of the
central pastors at Manna, told members of the congregation:
Let’s share (with others) about being multiethnic . . . Pentecost was a
multi-lingual church. The Greeks and Jews didn’t distribute things
well enough. But God wanted everyone . . . This applies to . . .
Manna.
Manna’s goal to become a fully multiethnic congregation was reflected
in my conversations with individual Korean Americans in the church.
This goal meant that Manna de-emphasized differences, socioeconomic or ethnic, in favour of discussing the common characteristics
of the church membership.
Korean Americans at Manna told me church teachings and the
church leadership often helped them to see the spiritual importance of
race relations and diversity more generally. Helen, twenty-five, worked
as an administrative assistant for a trading firm. She said:
I was really glad that I went to Manna, because it opened me up. I
never had many friends outside the Korean church. It was great, just
to meet people from different backgrounds and to be able to worship
the same God together, even though their ways might be different,
our heart was the same.
Helen told me that attending Manna helped her see the importance of
valuing ethnic diversity and diversity more generally.
Korean Americans in multiethnic churches outside of Manna also
said their congregations helped them to see the importance of
diversity. Jack, twenty-nine, attended a multiethnic congregation in

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California. Jack said being a member of a multiethnic church really
‘opened his eyes’ to thinking about race:

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A topic that we recently covered was racial reconciliation. That’s a
huge belief that I think the church really opened my eyes to,
personally. I don’t know if I’ve reconciled. But I know there needs to
be some kind of change in my belief system or my attitude toward
the whole idea of racial reconciliation.
As Jack understood it, while he was not thinking about racial
reconciliation before attending his congregation, his church provided
a religious lens through which to view race relations.
In sermons and in interviews with leaders and individual Korean
Americans at Manna, I noticed wealth was talked about as part of
God’s unmerited blessing rather than something they earned through
their own hard work. This perspective formed the foundation for
commonality between Korean Americans and other non-white Americans. Jim, twenty-five, attended seminary and worked as the youth
pastor at Manna. He told me his father’s story as an example of why
he provides help to those who have fewer financial resources than he
does. According to Jim:
I hope to be used in some way to channel the resources that God has
blessed us with to the poor, to those that don’t have as much . . .
Because my dad didn’t have much when he came here.
Instead of seeing material wealth and working hard primarily as things
that he and his parents gained mainly through special cultural or
ethnic predisposition, Jim, a church leader, saw them as ‘gifts from
God.’ Having been blessed with these gifts entailed a responsibility to
help others who had fewer resources.
Being a member of Manna also gave Korean Americans cultural
resources to think about aspirations differently. Sasha, twenty-two,
worked at a Korean school. After beginning to attend Manna, Sasha
told me her view of spirituality and success changed:
I was made to be a certain way and in the Korean church I wasn’t
able to be who I was made to be. I was kind of shut out. And then
when I found Manna, I felt like wow, this is it. God created me to be
a certain way and I felt like I finally found help, the help I needed to
discover all the great things that God wanted me to pursue . . . I
think that even though our parents go to church, and are very
committed . . . when they talk to you about your career decisions . . .
it is not about God first, it is about succeed, success first.

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Manna gave Sasha a narrative for success, which was legitimate within
her religious framework. Sasha began to see pursuing her own career
decisions not merely as gaining distance from her parents or becoming
more assimilated to mainstream American culture, but as developing a
clearer understanding of ‘God’s will.’
While those at Grace, the second generation Korean church,
emphasized their inability to relate to Old Town’s residents, Korean
Americans at Manna, a multiethnic church, stressed commonality
with those in the urban area. Ninety-five per cent of the Korean
Americans at Manna talked about what Korean Americans had in
common with other ethnic minorities and 83 per cent of Korean
Americans in multiethnic congregations outside Manna adopted such
a ‘commonality’ position. Jeremy, twenty-one, and a college student
told me that attending Manna helped him to think more about
reaching out to Old Town.
Because if you think about it those families in Old Town, they are
parents that are working their butts off to get their kids out of that
neighbourhood so (their) kids won’t have to grow up in an
environment with drugs and violence . . . They are working so
hard to get their kids out of there.
Jeremy viewed the people in Old Town as essentially ‘hard-working’
those who were doing their best against difficult odds, categories that
classified them as similar to Korean Americans rather than ‘other’.
Using religious resources to stress identities as ethnic minorities
rather than as middle-class professionals had consequences for civic
life, particularly the negotiation of group boundaries with black
Americans. Korean Americans at Manna emphasized similarities
between Korean and black Americans and talked about the spiritual
root of conflict, thereby removing blame from either group. Jeremy
also told me:
At my church now, I feel like I fit in the most with a guy (who is) an
African American . . . My view is that African Americans and
Koreans would get along really well, but that Satan, the enemy, has
tried to make it so that we would hate one another . . . I think we
would get along so well because we both go through similar issues.
Like debt and poverty and . . . just the whole thing with family and I
just think that both are very warm. Like we have warm sides to the
parents and a very disciplinary side to the parents as well.
Jeremy implicitly rejected the idea that Korean Americans were model
minorities by saying that they, like black Americans, had also
struggled to overcome poverty and, in his opinion, that both groups

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had family-oriented cultures. Manna provided Jeremy with a frame for
conflict. The two groups were meant to be together. Conflicts were not
due to the unwillingness of black Americans to follow the work ethic
of Koreans; rather, the root of conflict was spiritual; it was simply the
‘work of Satan.’
These interpretations of group boundaries had consequences for
ideas about civic life. For example, Korean Americans at Manna and
other multiethnic churches were more likely to talk about political
mobilization on the part of black Americans in ways that affirmed
their solidarity. Eve, twenty-two, worked in business and attended
Manna. She spoke favourably of the political achievements of black
Americans and talked about cases of conflict between the two groups
as ‘isolated incidents’ that should not affect their overall relationship:
Despite their (black Americans’) history and discrimination and
what they went through, they are still able to voice it and they stand
up for their rights and even their mistreatments in the past. (Where
would you be most likely to volunteer?) An urban community is where
I would have to live. And I really, really love black children. I think
they are the cutest kids ever. I get their culture more than any other
culture.
Both Bill, the member of Grace mentioned above, and Eve, had
exposure to middle-class and poor black Americans. When compared
with Bill, however, Eve treated the experiences black Americans had
with racism as genuine. Exposure was not enough to dispel images of
Korean Americans as model minorities; rather religion, as it was
understood at Manna and other multiethnic churches, in part, helped
Korean American members to re-negotiate boundaries with other
racial groups and challenged the reproduction of Koreans as model
minorities.
Conclusions
Using a cultural framework that takes individual agency into
consideration, I have provided evidence that Korean American
evangelicals in different ethnic religious contexts created group
boundaries in different ways. The narratives of Korean Americans in
second-generation and multiethnic churches reflected the ways in
which their church communities connected religious with racial and
socio-economic categories. Such constructs helped them to either
accept or reject images of Asian Americans as model minorities and
had consequences for civic life. While members of Grace and other
second-generation churches used interpretations of Christianity to put
constraints on financial success, the teaching of the congregation still

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Elaine Howard Ecklund

largely defined Korean Americans as inherently successful and thus
different from other ethnic minority Americans. This group of Korean
Americans constructed boundaries between themselves and those they
thought of as less hard working, and expressed difficulty in helping
these ‘other’ Americans.
Even though they shared largely the same socio-economic and
professional status position as respondents at Grace, many of the
Korean Americans at Manna and other multiethnic churches said
church teachings changed their approach to inter-racial relationships.
They came to view themselves more as ethnic minority Americans
than as middle-class Americans. These Korean Americans interpreted
financial success in ways that stressed their commonality with other
groups, and viewed wealth accumulation as a result of ‘God’s
provision’. This perspective allowed them to challenge aspects of
Koreans as model minorities and helped them to recognize commonality with black Americans.
These results have important implications for American religious
life. Although far more Korean Americans remain part of congregations composed largely of Koreans rather than becoming members of
ethnically diverse congregations, an increasing number attend panAsian and multiethnic churches (Min and Kim 2002). Manna and the
other multiethnic congregations in which I spoke with Korean
Americans made being an ethnically diverse church central to their
core mission of ‘sharing the gospel’. Korean Americans in these
contexts found ways to break barriers between Asian ethnic groups
and develop relationships with non-Asians because doing so was
central to their version of the Christian mission. This particular
approach affected the way Korean Americans formed group boundaries.
If the results for Korean Americans in the multiethnic churches I
studied are replicated among those in other ethnically diverse
churches, they reveal the ability of Korean Americans, and potentially
other second-generation immigrants, to change American religious
life. If religiously-based identities are found among a third generation
of Korean Americans, this would confirm Will Herberg’s (1955) theory
that it is the religious rather than other kinds of roots to which new
Americans return. There is also the possibility that Korean Americans
and other groups of new Americans will not only ‘assimilate’ into the
broad religious category of Protestantism, as Herberg might postulate,
but also change the civic boundaries of religion and ethnicity in
American Protestantism, particularly those of evangelicalism.
This research also contributes to scholarly understanding of the
intersection between race and civic life for new Americans. According
to Michael Emerson and Christian Smith (2000), only between 7 and
10 per cent of congregations in the United States are multiethnic or

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multiracial. Since most congregations are monoracial, remaining part
of an English-speaking Korean congregation or Asian American
congregation would have been a more natural step towards assimilation for Korean Americans than joining a multiethnic church. Korean
Americans in multiethnic and multiracial churches may actually gain
resources that change how civic life is constructed in American society
through re-classifying group boundaries and the symbols surrounding
such boundaries. For example, when individuals act as if discord
between black and Korean Americans is not the result of inherent
ethnic and class differences but simply ‘the work of Satan’ such reorientations may change the actual relationships between these two
groups outside of religious contexts.
These findings are further relevant to inter-group relationships in
non-religious organizations. Merely being a member of a diverse
organization may not be enough to change the perspective individuals
have towards those of another race, ethnicity, or gender. There is often
demographic diversity in organizations, particularly of women and
racial and ethnic minorities, yet these groups still experience discriminatory practices (Pettigrew and Martin 1987). The data I have
presented here reveal that membership in a multiethnic or multiracial
organization may influence the attitudes of individuals most when
racial diversity is crucial to accomplishing the core purpose and
mission of the organization (Emerson and Smith 2000).
Most generally, I have shown how new Americans might create
boundaries between their groups and others in ways that re-structure
civic life. By using a cultural lens that allows for individual agency in
responding to and creating group boundaries and societal constructs,
this work joins with that of other researchers who show culture is not
only imposed on individuals but can be used by them in the
construction of identities (Cornell 1996). Based on these findings,
researchers should consider how new Americans use the discourse in
different voluntary organizations to create moral categories for civic
life. Examining how Korean Americans in different ethnic religious
contexts socially reproduce and challenge ethnic constructs that have
consequences for civic life is a piece of much broader work that needs
to be done. Such work should study not only how non-white
immigrants adapt to prevailing narratives and practices of American
civil society. We should also be concerned with how immigrants and
their children might re-configure civil society in their own terms.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Wendy Cadge, Carolyn Chen, Philip Kim, Jerry
Park, the editor and two anonymous Ethnic and Racial Studies
reviewers for comments on earlier versions of this article. The research

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was supported by grants from the Society for the Scientific Study of
Religion and the Religious Research Association.

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Notes
1. ‘Second generation’ generally means those who were born in the United States, but have
parents who immigrated to the United States as adults. A few of my respondents were born in
Korea but came to the United States as young children and also identified as second
generation.
2. Immigration and Naturalization Service data for Korean migration: 1971 /1980/
271,956; 1981 /1990/338,800, 1991 /1996/113,667.
3. By ‘forms of capital’ I mean resources, both monetary and non-monetary, that have a
greater ‘pay-off’ than the commodity itself. For example, social capital could be networks
with those who can provide jobs in the ethnic enclave economy or relationships with family
members who encourage pursuing additional schooling (Nee and Sanders 2001).
4. See Smith et al . (1998) for an excellent discussion of American evangelicalism. Those
who identify as evangelicals share certain core beliefs, including the Bible as trustworthy,
hope for salvation in God’s son, Jesus and a personal knowledge of God. Smith contends at
least twenty million Americans identify with the evangelical movement.
5. ‘Black American’ includes African Americans, West Indians, and Africans. I have used
the term ‘African American’ where specifically stated by a respondent.
6. I use pseudonyms for the congregations and respondents in this article.